I should have it marked on my linen, and sit up in
bed to read it on my nightshirt."
"No, you wouldn't, Steinmetz," answered Alexis, with a vexed laugh. "You
would hate it just as much as I do, especially if it meant running away
from the best bear-shooting in Europe."
Steinmetz shrugged his shoulders.
"Then you should not have been charitable--charity, I tell you, Alexis,
covers no sins in this country."
"Who made me charitable? Besides, no decent-minded fellow could be
anything else here. Who told me of the League of Charity, I should like
to know? Who put me into it? Who aroused my pity for these poor beggars?
Who but a stout German cynic called Steinmetz?"
"Stout, yes--cynic, if you will--German, no!"
The words were jerked out of him by the galloping horse.
"Then what are you?"
Steinmetz looked straight in front of him, with a meditation in his
quiet eyes which made a dreamy man of him.
"That depends."
Alexis laughed.
"Yes, I know. In Germany you are a German, in Russia a Slav, in Poland a
Pole, and in England any thing the moment suggests."
"Exactly so. But to return to you. You must trust to me in this matter.
I know this country. I know what this League of Charity was. It was a
bigger thing than any dream of. It was a power in Russia--the greatest
of all--above Nihilism--above the Emperor himself.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25